This paper discusses the significance of the repeal of the Lex Oppia in women's rights in the Roman world. The Lex Oppia was a sumptuary law that restricted women's rights to adornments during wartime. After the debate between Cato and Lucius Valerius, and women's effort in the political protest, the law was repealed. Nevertheless, the rhetorics Cato and Valerius adopted appealed to patriarchal dominance. Similar means of protest were adopted later in Hortensia's repeal on taxation on women. While sumptuary laws on women were for wartime emergency, these laws were ultimately a means to curtail female power and strengthen male dominance. And thus, the abrogation of sumptuary laws is a way for women to gain power through economic meansa step forward for women's rights.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.